Best Laid Plans
by Cardinal Rose
Summary: The Doctor honestly just wanted a quiet day. So, when on the run from mercenary Judoon, he didn't think his day could get any worse. How wrong he was. Enter Jack Harkness and a misbehaving TARDIS, and things could only go from bad to worse. Eventual Ten/Rose, and Jack/Ianto
1. Chapter 1

**AN:**

**It is incredibly irresponsible of me to start another story when I've got so many WiP's, but I can't help myself. The plot bunny bit and I had to follow my muse.**

**I'm sorry the summary is so awful, but I don't want to give away the plot just yet. If you know me, you can guess what the pairings are going to be. I just don't want to spoil how I'm going to get there.**

**Until chapter 2, please read this and let me know what you think. (It's my first time writing Canon). Without further ado, chapter 1!**

* * *

All he had wanted was a nice, quiet trip for a change. No running, no misunderstandings, no one trying to force him into wedlock - just him and Donna and a peaceful planet with a beach for relaxing on. That was all he had wanted. Honestly. Scout's honour - not that he was ever a scout, but still, the point remained. So, naturally, that was how he and Donna ended up here. Running for their lives through the corridors of a starship (the TARDIS had been in one of her uncooperative moods), while chased by a fleet of angry aliens. The Doctor skidded around a corner, blocking out the threatening diatribe of Donna somehow coming at him from all angles. Around another corner, down the corridor, avoiding the blaster bolts from behind, and there! Waiting just down the corridor, their salvation. A snap of his fingers opened the royal blue doors, he and Donna hurtling in like they were being chased by the very hounds of hell - not that far fetched, considering the consequences if they were caught by this particular faction of Judoon. While Donna slumped on the jumpseat, gasping for breath, the Doctor danced around the console, stabbing buttons, spinning things, and slamming levers almost faster than the eye could see. The urgency to his movements was encouraged by the wailing of the perimeter alarms; the mercenary Judoon platoon were almost at the junction to the TARDIS.

* * *

Donna recovered enough of her breath, and joined him by the monitor. They watched in almost silent horror as the Judoon marched endlessly down the corridor towards them. "Doctor" she said, almost too quietly for the brash Chiswick Super-temp. "Do something." The Doctor jumped into action, performing the usual routine to send them back into the relative safety of the Vortex. Nothing happened. The Doctor stood there, gaping almost gormlessly at the controls. It should have worked (he did everything normally, even the thing that emptied out the waste tanks on level seven), and yet the TARDIS hadn't dematerialised. When it finally occured to him (and he blamed the three other hostile planets they'd visited in the last twenty-four hours), the Doctor was stunned enough that he breathed it out loud.

"We can't leave."

"What do you mean we can't leave?!" Donna's shriek stabbed directly into his head. It was definitely overkill, considering that she was standing right beside him.

"The TARDIS won't take off" the Doctor snapped, reaching for the mallet. Maybe a good whacking would entice the Old Girl into cooperating. He was sure she left them stuck in these situations on purpose sometimes. The TARDIS shuddered and groaned, but remained firmly, almost stubbornly, in place. "What's the matter with you?" The Doctor wondered, stroking the coral of the console gently. His Old Girl wheezed and lit up her rotor apologetically. He didn't need a psychic link to understand what she was trying to tell him - they were stuck.

* * *

Ten minutes and all of the Doctor's best (and most impulsive) ideas later, they were still stuck. In fact, the Doctor would go so far as to say that their situation had actually worsened. The Judoon, instead of marching through the corridors in pursuit of them, were now hammering on the doors, demanding their immediate and unconditional surrender. Everything about their present circumstances was reminding him uncomfortably of Pompeii. Only this time, they had the silver lining of not having twenty thousand people's lives hanging in the balance. Donna slipped her hand into his, pulling him out of the abyss of guilt and grief thoughts of Pompeii always drove him into. It was the simplest thing to comfort; having a hand to hold as you cross the universe - even when that hand belonged to his brash best friend Donna, and not his beautiful pink and yellow Rose. "What are we going to do, Spaceman?" Donna asked, her attempt at levity falling flat for the both of them. She looked uncertain, not scared but worried. And that? That he was never going to let stand. He had gotten her into this mess, and it was his duty, his responsibility to get her out of it again.

"I'm gonna go out there, let my gob run away with me, and then try and find a way to disable whatever is stopping the Old Girl from taking off. When the coast is clear, she should be able to take you home, and then come and get me again." As soon as he finished speaking, the Doctor registered a pain spreading across his upper arm. Donna had hit him, again! "Oi! What was that for?!" His companion glared at him, outrage snapping in her hazel eyes.

"If you think that I'm going to let you go off and track down some outer space gismo with rhino boy still outside, you've got another thing coming!"

"It's not an outer space gismo, Donna" the Doctor sighed. Although he wasn't entirely sure why he even bothered at this point. For Donna, everything was an outer space something, unless they were safely back on Earth. Donna simply raised her eyebrow with crossed arms, silently daring him to tell her exactly what it was then. There, he floundered. "It's a- Well, it's a-"

"Yes?" Donna invited, her tone sarcastically all ears. The Doctor rubbed the back of his neck sheepishly, unwilling to admit that he had no idea exactly what it was. Fortunately, he didn't have to.

"They've enabled some sort of temporal dampening field" a gentle Welsh accent announced, sounding short of breath. The Doctor spun on his heels, blinking in amazement at the sight of Jack Harkness and a rather well-put together man almost bent double before the console. The Judoon thundering on the door had obviously drowned out the intruder materialisation alarm (the Doctor made a mental note to fix that, make it louder). "We weakened it a little, but our vortex manipulator can't break through."

"Which was when we latched on to your location. Hope you don't mind us hitching a ride."

"Jack?!" The Doctor felt his jaw drop open. And that was to say nothing about the way Donna was feasting on the sight of the fifty-first century human. "What are you doing here?"

"Long story" Jack gasped, flapping his hands at him. "Doc, Into Jones. Ianto, the Doctor. Now get us out of here!"

"How?!" The Doctor raised his hands suddenly, feeling about as thick as he ever had. "No. Shut up. I've got it. If I press this button here, and engage this tertiary system, theoretically we might get enough of a boost to break through the inertia of the dampening field." He glanced at Jack, waiting for the approbation of his genius plan. The Captain, for once, decided not to disappoint. He nodded and joined the Doctor at the console, abandoning his companion for the first time since they'd materialised in the TARDIS.

"Set the coordinates for the Rift; you can drop us home, and refuel at the same time."

* * *

It was a brilliant plan. Really it was. It even worked, momentarily. They got off the spaceship just fine, but it was when they tried to leave the vortex for Cardiff that things rapidly went south. If the Doctor was thinking clearly, he would have realised that this was really quite familiar, but given the circumstances, he could be forgiven for not recognising the similarities. The TARDIS jolted and shook, sending them toppling this way and that. Jack lurched into the jumpseat, Donna tumbled into the console, and the Doctor and Into slammed rather painfully into one another before ending up without any dignity on the TARDIS floor. If only that was the worst part, it would have been quite a normal occurrence. But, this was the Doctor, and nothing ever went the easy course with him. Around them, the TARDIS struggled to function, almost unable to resist the natural pull of the vortex. The lights flashed brilliantly, a sharp siren split the air.

The TARDIS darkened. The siren silenced. They fell.

* * *

**Thank you for reading!**

**Please review to let me know whether or not to carry on!**


	2. Chapter 2

**A/N:**

**Hi, the irresponsible update author is back online.**

**Originally this story was supposed to be light and fluffy and short, but the Muse (who glanced at my writing and definitely did not approve) demanded changes. So, apparently there is now *shudder* _story_ involved.**

* * *

It was with a hollow, sinking feeling that the Doctor became aware of his surroundings. The TARDIS was silent, eerily so - no soft humming, no feelings of mischief at having neglected to set them down where he had wanted. Just nothing. The Doctor struggled to his feet, squinting in the barely-there dim green light. It was painfully familiar. But even now something deep inside of him rebelled at the faint flickering candle of hope that had lit itself inside his hearts. There was just no possible way that this could be what he so desperately longed for. In all of the billion billion parallel worlds and alternative universes in the infinite complexity of time and space, it was impossible that they could have returned back to Pete's World. He'd done the calculations - oh so many times. Even if, by some cruel twist of fate, there were zeppelins in the sky outside, it couldn't be- it _wouldn't_ be Pete's World. The Doctor had sealed off that universe - for good. Determined to rid that pesky hope from his chest, the Doctor jumped to his feet and toppled against the lifeless console of his beloved ship. Completely ignoring Donna (grumbling to herself about Martains who couldn't pass driving license tests), he tiptoed to the doors and eased them open. And then he promptly wished he hadn't.

* * *

A loud screech came from the air above Roald Dahl Plass, followed by an explosion of such intense heat the Doctor slammed the TARDIS doors shut and patted his hair to make sure it wasn't on fire. "So" Jack began, leaning casually against the nearest coral beam. "Where'd we end up this time? Beginning of the universe? End of the universe? The actual location of hell?" Risking another peek out of the door, the Doctor decided that it was safe enough (for Jack) to be able to answer his own question. He grinned at the Captain and jerked his head.

"See for yourself." Jack, naturally, tossed his coat on, then strutted out the door. Even here, he exuded his 51st century charisma and the arrogance of the good-looking.

"Congrats, Doc" Jack whistled, for once looking impressed (and so he should, the Doctor was very impressive - and his inner Koschei could shut up). "You landed us right on top of the Rift." His words summoned Ianto, who followed the pair outside.

"Cardiff?" Ianto glanced from Jack to the Doctor and back again. "We're home?"

"Not quite" the Doctor sighed, wondering why it was always him that these things happened to. Was a normal day too much to ask for? It was even a Sunday for Rassilon's sake! Anyway, just as he had opened his mouth to answer Ianto's unspoken demand to know how they could be 'not quite' home, Donna burst out of the TARDIS like a redheaded storm.

"Wales?!" Donna scowled, turning her most displeased glare on to the Doctor. Which, really, was definitely uncalled for. It wasn't as if it was _his_ fault that his TARDIS had fallen through a gap in the universes. Again. "Why are we in Wales?"

"Big picture, Donna" the Doctor snarked. "Why are there burning _zeppelins_ in the sky in Wales?" This wasn't Pete's world, it couldn't be - not even with the Zeppelins.

"Oh, that's easy" Jack smirked (always trouble with him, really there was), burying his hands in his pockets. He shot a grin at the sky and winked at the Doctor. "Dragon." The Doctor manfully resisted the temptation to roll his eyes extravagantly.

"There are no such things as _dragons,_ Jack. There are, however, certain species of winged fire-breathing lizards native to the-"

"They're dragons!" Donna yelled, right in his ear. Again. This was not turning out to be the Doctor's week. Fortunately, Jack decided that this was the time to demonstrate his prowess at team leadership. Or in other words, rescue the Doctor from another rant from Donna.

"I'm guessing that even if Torchwood is active here, they're not going to come and deal with the situation, so that means it's up to us again."

"So, how do we send Smaug back to the Lonely Mountain?" Donna wondered, turning expectantly to the Doctor.

"Actually Yan and I were trying to catch one of these magnificent creatures when my vortex manipulator went haywire and we ended up on Angry Rhino Soldier World" Jack announced, pulling some technical thingamajig out of his coat pocket. "Since there's clearly nobody home downstairs, why don't you and Donna use your Sonic to either build some shelves or open the door and get the cells ready for entertaining."

"Jack and I have got this, Doctor" Ianto agreed, ushering them pointedly towards where the Doctor assumed the entrance to this universe's Torchwood Cardiff (assuming that even existed here - which hadn't been proven) would be.

"I'll just Sonic that door open and see if there's anything worth salvaging then" the Doctor said, shaking off the suddenly foreboding feeling he was getting. The TARDIS wasn't working, they were clearly needed - he could see something happening here. And he didn't like it.

* * *

Donna frogmarched him straight up to the information centre, and practically pushed him into the frankly uninformative building. While he examined the room with his sonic (looking very cool if he did say so himself - and he did have to), Donna absently typed on the computer (his brilliant Super Temp). It was then, and Rassilon only knew how, that his Sonic detected a new flow of electricity to the righthand side of the building (entrance-wise). He shoved his hands in his pockets and bounced forward, peering eagerly through the doorway into a rather uninspiring corridor. Down they went and onto an elevator (with a bit of prompting from his Sonic). There was an absolutely brilliant cog-shaped door ahead of them, his mind spinning with the mathematics and science of all of it (humans really were brilliant people - or at least the ones who didn't think it was a good idea to make holes in the fabric of reality bigger were). Donna grabbed his hand, her concern stopping him in his tracks. There were blast marks on that door, dents, and splashes of something that looked suspiciously like dried blood.

* * *

Beyond the door was chaos, not the wonderfully messy chaos of his TARDIS, but the destructive havoc of a true disaster. It reminded the Doctor painfully of some of the sites from the War, and he steeled his hearts against the pain of the reminder. Destroyed furniture, machinery, old takeaway boxes, computers that faintly flickered with life only to die seconds later... How long he and Donna stood there, silently staring at the destruction, he couldn't say. All he knew was that Jack's return broke them out of their daze. "We sent that lovely lady back through the Rift no problem" Jack called, voice light and cheerful.

"Oh _yes,_ Jack" Ianto agreed, sarcasm dripping from his dry Welsh accent. "You only died once, no problem at all."

"Exactly" Jack beamed, turning back to face the Hub. All colour drained from his face, horror written into every motion of his eyes. "What happened here?" The Doctor had his - horrible - suspicions, but he scanned once with his Sonic to be sure.

"Biological deatomising bomb. Military grade." Understanding passed between Jack and the Doctor, both old soldiers, both having seen the worst that the universe could throw at them. Ianto and Donna, on the other hand, stared at the and demanded answers.

"Military grade" Ianto echoed, turning not to Jack but to the Doctor for answers. "I don't understand."

"In the twenty-fifth century, Earth's military developed a revolutionary new weapon for dealing with the 'Alien Threat'" the Doctor explained, keeping his voice low and quiet. "The research was pioneered by scientists working with old Earth technology scavenged from the ruins of Canary Wharf."

"So, what happened here?" Donna asked, Ianto apparently unable to form words and merely mutely gripped Jack's offered hand. The Doctor glanced at Jack and shook his head. He didn't want to say, couldn't really judge for certain, but he thought, it was likely that-

"It was a hit" Jack announced, low and terrible. "Someone took out Torchwood Three. And I'm betting that it was Torchwood One."

* * *

Thank you for reading!

If you have the time and inclination, please review!


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